Toughened up

We spent some time with our 9-year old nephew Sam over Christmas. He's a cheeky little chap, very lovable, EXTREMELY loud and can be a right handful at times. He's usually pretty good with us but that's the novelty of being an Auntie and Uncle I guess.

Sam has an awful lot of female company as his mum and dad split up a few years ago and so he lives with his mum and sister and they spend a lot of time with J's best friend and her two daughters. So on a regular basis, Sam lives and spends time with five women around the house. His Grandad takes him to football and he does have a male teacher at school but of course the female influences do rub off. He loves it when R and I come around as we are all about rough and tumble and usually end up throwing a rugby ball, wrestling on the floor or jumping on the trampoline.

It's funny because he loves it and pretends to be a tough guy, until you get the better of him when he begins to squeal and screech 'ouch' and 'you're hurting me.' Over Christmas we were playing (indoor) rugby and he kept behaving like such a girl at times that I couldn't help myself and kept telling him to 'man up.' It's not that I lectured him or anything but just talked to him a bit about playing rugby and how you had to take the hits and not be a wuss for nothing. It was amazing actually as he definitely thought about it at the time and just in that day I could see the difference in the way he acted as we played.

We haven't seen Sam since just after Christmas but R went down to his sisters today on an errand and when I got back from work he relayed a message to me, from Sam, via J. It was "tell Auntie Sarah that I'm toughened up quite a bit now"

Bless him! I actually feel quite guilty but my heart pounds with love that he's thought about what I said and thinks enough of me to put it into action. It makes me feel such a massive sense of responsibility that a little chap would listen and take notice of what I say. I just hope I have enough common sense and strength to do the right thing by all my nieces and nephews and to only influence them in good ways